Smile Factory Merges With Borrego Community Health Foundation
Marking its debut in the field of pediatric dentistry, the Borrego Community Health Foundation has announced its merger with The Smile Factory Foundation, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to improve the oral health of children residing in the desert region.
“We are very pleased to welcome The Smile Factory to our team,” said Bruce Hebets, chief executive officer of the BCHF. “The addition of The Smile Factory expands our ability to offer a more extensive array of health services and further our goal of providing special services to the children of our region.”
Founded in 2000, The Smile Factory provides free screenings and dental treatment to approximately 17,000 children a year, as well as a range of individual dental services to more than 2,000 children who are in need, according to Eve Fromberg, who joins the BCHF as manager of the a new BCHF division called Mobile Dental Services.
With its 53-foot mobile dental clinic, the Palm Springs-based service provides free dental treatment for children between the ages of 4 and 11 at 18 elementary schools in Palm Springs Unified School District, 20 elementary schools in the Desert Sands Unified School District, as well as kindergarteners in Coachella Valley Unified School District.
In addition, The Smile Factory has extended its outreach beyond local schools to medical facilities such as the Borrego Community Health Foundation’s medical clinic in Cathedral City and local charities serving children. It recently served approximately 50 children through the JFK Memorial Foundation and last summer provided free dental screening and services for 45 children attending the Boys and Girls Club of Palm Springs.
Hebets said preliminary plans are being made to have the mobile unit conduct special children’s clinics at the Borrego Medical Center and other BCHF facilities.
Children’s dental problems have reached epidemic proportions in California, surpassing asthma and obesity as major childhood healthcare concerns, according to Fromberg. It is estimated that 750,000 California school children may need dental care they are not getting and 138,000 of these children are in need of urgent care, she said. Recent studies conclude that over 50 percent of lost school days in an academic year are attributed to untreated dental problems, which have a profound impact on a child’s learning capabilities.
“The Smile Factory is a model program that addresses the issue of access to dental care,” Fromberg said. “Our mobile dental clinic is moved to elementary schools that have 70 percent or more qualifying under the free and reduced lunch program, currently defined as a family of four earning less than $35,000 per year.”